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Zoning reform is increasingly recognised as an important strategy to increase housing affordability and environmental sustainability. Few cities have undertaken significant upzoning of low-density neighbourhoods, making the 2016 Auckland Unitary Plan (AUP) probably the most ambitious zoning reform in the world. Parcels zoned for single houses previously dominated Auckland, but three-quarters of them now allow multiple units. Existing studies have documented the building boom that followed this zoning reform, yet the relatively rare case offers additional insights. In this article, we use appraisal, census and zoning data on over 200,000 parcels in Auckland to answer three research questions about the heterogeneous impacts of the AUP. First, to what extent did upzoning increase the appraised value of properties' redevelopment options? Second, did upzoning increase appraised property values to a greater degree in higher-income and more centrally located neighbourhoods? Finally, was zoning reform in Auckland significantly influenced by similar political pressures as in other countries? That is, was upzoning less likely (and downzoning more likely) in higher-income neighbourhoods? The answers to these three questions are substantially, it's complicated, and yes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper aims to develop a house price forecasting model to investigate the impact of neighbourhood effect on property value. Design/methodology/approach: Multi-level modelling (MLM) method is used to develop the house price forecasting models. The neighbourhood effects, that is, socio-economic conditions that exist in various locations, are included in this study. Data from the local government area in Greater Sydney, Australia, has been collected to test the developed model. Findings: Results show that the multi-level models can account for the neighbourhood effects and provide accurate forecasting results. Research limitations/implications: It is believed that the impacts on specific households may be different because of the price differences in various geographic areas. The "neighbourhood" is an important consideration in housing purchase decisions. Practical implications: While increasing housing supply provisions to match the housing demand, governments may consider improving the quality of neighbourhood conditions such as transportation, surrounding environment and public space security. Originality/value: The demand and supply of housing in different locations have not behaved uniformly over time, that is, they demonstrate spatial heterogeneity. The use of MLM extends the standard hedonic model to incorporate physical characteristics and socio-economic variables to estimate dwelling prices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The causal impact of the built environment on travel behaviours is a subject of debate. This debate especially concerns the independent effect of the built environment on the observed travel patterns after taking into account residential self-selection arising from pre-existing travel-related attitude. This study argues that travel attitude varies over time, and thus, is also reshaped by residential built environment and interrelated with residents' travel behaviours. Focusing on the event of residential relocation in the Netherlands, this study longitudinally investigated the interrelations between travel mode choices and preferences before, immediately after and a year after the relocation. Results from the random-intercept cross-lagged panel models substantiated the residential self-selection based on the pre-relocation preferences for motorised means of transport, including cars and public transport. Moreover, travel mode preferences varied to a greater extent than travel mode use pre–post relocation, and especially, frequent use of public transport or bicycles stimulated by the new place of residence had a one-year lagged effect on developing the mode preference. Therefore, the structural role of residential built environment manifests as (re)shaping travel mode choices as well as mode-specific preferences in the process of residential relocation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines if universities in the UK mediate the impacts of spatial inequalities on earnings disparities among similar graduates and provides new evidence on the persistent income inequality at the neighbourhood level, using the Destination of Leavers from Higher Education (DLHE) survey data on the population of individuals graduating from universities in 2012/13. The results suggest that graduates from neighbourhoods with the highest university participation rate, on average, have higher earnings than those from the lowest-participation neighbourhoods, holding demographic features and university-related factors constant. The earnings gap by the neighbourhood quality remains substantial so that males from the lowest-participation neighbourhoods with a degree from the Russell Group barely earn higher incomes than their peers from the highest-participation areas who attended a less prestigious university. These results imply that universities in the UK do not fully level the playing field in terms of earnings disparities among graduates from different neighbourhoods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban areas are facing increasing social inequalities, which governments try to tackle with social policy. This study examines one of the most ambitious urban policies in the history of Dutch policies that aims to increase educational attainment amongst disadvantaged children in one of the poorest areas in the Netherlands. We investigate to what extent inequality in educational attainment based on parental education has changed during the first period of this programme. We further examine to what extent school characteristics affect educational attainment and how these effects relate to targeting disadvantaged areas for policy intervention. Register data on the individual, school and area level were employed to study these issues. We find that the effect of parental education on secondary school attainment has been stable since the start of the programme, indicating that inequality has not decreased in the context of the programme. Furthermore, several school characteristics, including socioeconomic status and retention rate, were relevant in explaining differences in educational attainment. We discuss the implications of our findings regarding the allocation of public resources for policy programmes based on area and school characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neighbourhood effects research has benefited from the application of sequence analysis which, together with cluster analysis, identifies the main temporal patterns of exposure to residential contexts experienced by different groups of people, such as children. However, given that this is a relatively new approach to measuring exposure to neighbourhood deprivation, studies that have utilised sequence analysis to model residential trajectories and test for neighbourhood effects do not contextualise these population-level findings at the individual-level. The current study sought to investigate the patterns of exposure to neighbourhood deprivation experienced by children in Aotearoa New Zealand over the first eight years of life by utilising two different methodological approaches: at the macro-level, the results of the sequence and cluster analysis suggest that in general, children experienced little neighbourhood mobility; at the micro-level, children experienced greater levels of movement between different levels of neighbourhood deprivation in middle childhood, compared to early childhood, while children in the least and most deprived neighbourhoods experienced less mobility than their peers. Together, these findings provide a comprehensive description of the ways in which children are exposed to different residential contexts over time and advance our understandings of how to document these experiences effectively within quantitative research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study empirically examines the peer effects of household spending on human affairs, clothing, food, and education in rural China, where villages are often characterized by clan clustering. We employ an iterative algorithm that combines the least square dummy variables regression and instrumental variable estimators to measure the peer effects and their heterogeneity. The results provide compelling evidence for the existence of peer effects on human affairs, clothing, and food expenditures, while the peer effects on education investment come from aligning with high-level spending rather than converging to the average. Furthermore, high- and low-spending households are affected differently by peers and play different roles in the peer group. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the energy transition and CO2 emissions reduction as a priority on the international policy agenda, governments worldwide are trying to engage the population in investing in renewable energies. In this paper, we study the role of information access and peer effects in the photovoltaics sector in the case of the Swiss canton of Vaud. Based on a representative survey of the population of two districts, Nyon and Jura-Nord Vaudois, we show that being a homeowner and knowing someone who has installed PV cells in your social group significantly increase the probability of putting up PV cells. A direct neighbourhood effect was found, meaning that if a neighbour has installed a PV cell, the probability of the inhabitants in the two case study regions installing one themselves increases significantly. Our results show that spatial proximity is an important factor in the transmission of information between peers. Besides pure geographical distance, additional aspects such as administrative boundaries, shared language or degree of urbanisation play a role in the way the information network is presented. These insights indicate that professional experts and neighbours are important points of reference in the decision to invest in PV, and that regional networks are key for the active spreading of information on renewable technologies. Thus, we recommend using these connections to actively promote PV.

The transition rules of cellular automata (CA) werestrengthened by incorporating annual growth rate (AGR) to reflect spatially heterogeneous neighbourhoods. We conducted hotspot (AGRHST) and gradient (AGRGDT) analysis of AGR to generate two spatial heterogeneity layers, then constructed three CA models: AGR-CA, AGRHST-CA and AGRGDT-CA. The modeling results showed that AGR-CA performed best in overall accuracy, AGRGDT-CA was superior to other models in terms of landscape pattern, and AGRHST-CA produced unrealistically smooth boundaries. The simulation accuracy of these models exceeds 89%, indicating that logistic regression-based simulation methods can be substantially improved by strengthening the neighbourhood effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A widely accepted finding in the literature on political participation is that individuals living in poorer neighbourhoods are less likely to vote than those living in more affluent neighbourhoods. Yet, why some poor residents of the most deprived neighbourhoods are more likely to vote than others is still understudied. This article presents a new theoretical framework arguing that when they believe that most others vote in the neighbourhood, poor citizens are more likely to follow their example than wealthy citizens. To empirically test these claims, I develop a two-level multilevel model using survey data and the Index of Multiple Deprivation for England. My findings point to the higher importance of a social norm of voting for the political behaviour of poor individuals than wealthy individuals. Social norms define which behaviour is right and proper. They are enforced through social interactions with others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies of neighbourhood effects typically measure the neighbourhood context at one specific spatial scale. It is increasingly acknowledged, however, that the mechanisms through which the residential context affects individual outcomes may operate at different spatial scales, ranging from the very immediate environment to the metropolitan region. We take a multi-scale approach to investigate the extent to which concentrated poverty in adolescence is related to obtained education level and income later in life, by measuring the residential context as bespoke neighbourhoods at five geographical scales that range from areas encompassing the 200 nearest neighbours to areas that include the 200k+ nearest neighbours. We use individual-level geocoded longitudinal register data from Sweden and the Netherlands to follow 15/16-year-olds until they are 30 years old. The findings show that the contextual effects on education are very similar in both countries. Living in a poor area as a teenager is related to a lower obtained educational level when people are in their late 20s. This relationship, however, is stronger for lower spatial scales. We also find effects of contextual poverty on income in both countries. Overall, this effect is stronger in the Netherlands than in Sweden. Partly, this is related to differences in spatial structure. If only individuals in densely populated areas in Sweden are considered, effects on income are similar across the two countries and income effects are more stable across spatial scales. Overall, we find important evidence that the scalar properties of neighbourhood effects differ across life-course outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sexual minority immigrant men have poor economic wellbeing compared to heterosexuals and the native-born. This may be because they are marginalised as both sexual minorities and immigrants, which can isolate them from the networks, resources, and support offered by neighbourhood ties. Using data from the 2016 Canadian census, I investigate whether neighbourhood composition mediates the disparities in employment status and wages between immigrant men in same-sex couples and those who are Canadian-born and/or different-sex-coupled. Immigrant men in same-sex couples on average live in neighbourhoods that are more economically disadvantaged than Canadian-borns, less populated with coethnics than immigrants in different-sex couples, and more populated with other same-sex couples in general. Neighbourhoods provide a positive mediating effect (i.e. a 'protective' effect) for immigrants in same-sex couples compared to immigrants in different-sex couples, but largely do not affect the economic gaps between them and Canadian-borns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Plant diversity has been found to increase herbivore diversity, including abundance, species richness and phylogenetic diversity. However, it is yet to be established at which spatial scale these effects are strongest, because host finding and community assembly may be shaped by host diversity both in local habitat patches and at larger scales.Using arthropod herbivore data collected from a large biodiversity and ecosystem function experiment in China (BEF‐China), we analysed how habitat patch (individual study plots) and larger‐scale (surrounding study plots) tree diversity relates to species richness, abundance, functional diversity and phylogenetic diversity of herbivore assemblages on focal plants.Tree diversity of both the focal habitat patch and larger‐scale patch neighbourhood affected herbivore diversity patterns and host plant selection, with the effect being greater for the former. Furthermore, focal and neighbouring trees that are phylogenetically related were found more likely to share similar herbivores.Synthesis. By focusing on tree diversity effects of both the local habitat patch and wider patch neighbourhoods, our findings highlight the importance of considering additional scales to give a more nuanced understanding of the mechanisms underlying herbivore community structure and diversity patterns in species‐rich forests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Existing research has extensively documented that those living in the most deprived neighbourhoods and individuals from some ethnic minority groups have low rates of labour market participation in the United Kingdom. This paper brings together these two established areas of research to ask whether ethnic minority groups have better employment participation when living in more deprived neighbourhoods. We hypothesise that this could be due to different socialisation processes enabling ethnic minorities to secure employment more easily in deprived neighbourhoods as well as in neighbourhoods where there is greater ethnic density. Data from the United Kingdom Household Longitudinal Study in England are linked to the Index of Multiple Deprivation 2014 and the 2011 Census to model unemployment and economic inactivity between 2009 and 2019 separately for women and men. The results show that some ethnic minority groups face disadvantage in the labour market, especially Pakistani and Bangladeshi women. There is little support to suggest that these penalties are lessened in more deprived neighbourhoods or in more ethnically dense neighbourhoods. There is some suggestion that groups who do not face ethnic penalties compared with the White British group have lower rates of unemployment and economic inactivity in more deprived neighbourhoods. We suggest policies aimed at improving labour market outcomes for disadvantaged ethnic minorities should target them wherever they live. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study maps early adulthood family life courses from ages 15 to 28 and tests whether they are causally linked to neighbourhood conditions with an instrumental strategy in the United States using Add Health data. Results show that the risk of sorting into pathways typified by early childbearing regardless of relationship status was higher in disadvantaged neighbourhoods. The instrumental variable strategy further showed that pathways characterized by single parenthood and early marriage with multiple children increased significantly with neighbourhood disadvantage, whereas other significant associations disappeared in these analyses. Overall, the results highlight the importance of considering multiple family events as a process outcome to understand the impact of neighbourhood conditions. Indeed, neighbourhood deprivation may lead to life courses associated with nonconventional outcomes. While some of the observed neighbourhood effects may be driven by selection bias in the United States, not all effects are necessarily due to selection and depend on the longitudinal family trajectories. These results were supported by several robustness tests, including the use of an alternative instrumental variable, as the main models suggested weak identification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Biotic interactions in plant communities affect individual fitness and community dynamics. Interactions between plants vary in space, over time and with organisational complexity. Yet it is challenging to quantify temporal, spatial and functional determinants of different types of interactions between long‐lived perennial plant species and their effect on lifetime fecundity.We studied how plant–plant, pollinator‐ and seed predator‐mediated interactions affect year‐to‐year variation in three fecundity components (cone production, seed set and seed survival) during post‐fire recovery. Age‐stratified data on the three fecundity components were collected in 19 even‐aged communities comprising 20 serotinous Protea shrub species in the South African Fynbos. We analyse data on these fecundity components with neighbourhood models to infer the sign and strength of interactions throughout post‐disturbance recovery, the neighbour plant traits that shape them and the spatial scale at which interactions take place. For each fecundity component, these models describe how neighbourhood effects change over time and with spatial distance between plants. We then predicted neighbourhood effects on individual fecundity components and cumulative reproductive output at different post‐fire stand ages for each focal plant.Competitive effects on cone production and seed set increased with post‐fire stand age as biomass and floral resources for pollinators build up. In contrast, neighbourhood effects on seed survival were weak throughout post‐disturbance recovery. Plant–plant interactions were shaped by neighbour traits related to resource acquisition, whereas animal‐mediated interactions depended on neighbour traits related to resource availability for pollinators and seed predators. The spatial scale of the interactions increased from plant–plant over predator‐mediated to pollinator‐mediated interactions. The joint effect of these interactions on cumulative reproductive output caused the proportion of focal plants experiencing competition to increase with time since fire.Synthesis. We show that temporal changes in biotic interactions throughout post‐disturbance recovery of perennial plant communities depend on functional traits and can be integrated into neighbourhood effects on lifetime fecundity. Studying the temporal, spatial and functional determinants of neighbourhood effects on lifetime fecundity is important for predicting not only individual plant fitness but also population and community dynamics in changing environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

John Bynner is a leading advocate of considering context in life course research. In this paper I review some of the ways contextual information on time and place may enrich the analysis of individual histories, as well as vice versa. I take three examples from my own research: (1) a late 20th century analysis of adult health and mortality in Britain where individual and area level evidence are combined; (2) a cross-national analysis of neighbourhood and family predictors of child outcomes at age five in Britain and the US from the early 2000s; and (3) workplace as the context of segregation and the gender pay gap in Britain as it changed over several decades to 2015. The article ends with a discussion of the pros and cons of incorporating contextual evidence in longitudinal survey data sets with reference to the UK Millennium Cohort Study, which John Bynner helped to bring into existence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper attempts to provide new evidence on the indirect cost of neighbourhood crime rates on mental wellbeing of residents. Crime places a heavy burden on the economy, and it receives significant attention from the public. Yet, the connection between crime and health for victims and non-victims is not well captured in the literature. Using spatial methodology, we differentiate the effect on mental wellbeing of residents due to the crime rates in their immediate neighbourhood (local) and crime rates in the surrounding areas (spatial). The main innovation of the paper is to use these crime rates at small geographical level (around 8500 residents) to better translate the changes in crime in the neighbourhoods and their effects on a person's mental wellbeing. This is different to other studies that looked at crime incidences in larger geographical units. Our estimation results show that the increase in local and spatial crime rates against the property negatively affect the mental wellbeing of residents. The negative impact of spatial crime rates against the person is also present and is 6.7 times larger than the effect of property crime rates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper estimates the causal effect of repeated exposure to violent crime on test scores in New York City. We use two empirical strategies; value-added models linking student performance on standardised exams to violent crimes on students' residential block, and a regression discontinuity approach that identifies the acute effect of additional crime exposure within a one-week window. Exposure to violent crime reduces academic performance. Value-added models suggest the average effect is very small (approximately −0.01 standard deviations) but grows with repeated exposure. Regression discontinuity (RD) models also find a larger effect among children previously exposed. The marginal acute effect is as large as −0.04 standard deviations for students with two or more prior exposures. Among these, it is almost one tenth of a standard deviation for Black students. We provide credible causal evidence that repeated exposure to neighbourhood violence harms test scores, and this negative effect increases with exposure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Educational disadvantage is a multilevel and multifactorial phenomenon, with a myriad of contributing factors having been identified within the social contexts inhabited by the student from a lower socioeconomic status (SES) background. Irish research has accumulated a comprehensive body of empirical evidence on the factors operating within family, school and societal contexts but less attention has been paid to the role that the neighbourhood might have in contributing to the under-achievement of students from lower SES backgrounds. This study employed data from the 9 and 17/18-year-old cohorts of the Growing Up in Ireland survey to explore whether the SES of the neighbourhood within which a student lives makes a significant contribution to the prediction of academic achievement over and above the SES of the family and school. A series of multilevel models demonstrated the additive effects of social contexts on academic achievement in both samples. Each social context provided a unique, statistically significant contribution to the prediction of academic achievement, with smaller contributions made by more distal contexts. These findings support an understanding of educational disadvantage as a phenomenon that is perpetuated within multiple social contexts and suggest that strategies to tackle educational disadvantage should take a pan-contextual perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives and Approach The CanNECD SES Index is a composite of 10 Canadian Census and Income Tax Filer variables, aggregated to 2,038 custom neighbourhoods covering all of Canada. The baseline 2006 Index accounted for 32% of the neighbourhood-level variance in overall developmental vulnerability in Kindergarten children, as measured by the Early Development Instrument (EDI). Other existing SES indices accounted for 17% at most. The Index now has two additional time points (2011 and 2016), which allows an evaluation of its consistency over time. Our objective is to assess three aspects of the Index’s temporal consistency. The first is the consistency of the strength of association between the Index and vulnerability rates across EDI developmental domains. The second is the consistency of neighbourhoods’ quintile rank over time. Finally, we use Confirmatory Factor Analysis in an SEM framework to assess the Index’s measurement invariance over time. Results For each EDI domain, the strength of association between Index scores and neighbourhood-level vulnerability rates were either maintained or minimally declined over time. Additionally, neighbourhood quintile rankings were highly consistent over time with over 60% of neighbourhoods in the same quintile between 2006 and 2016, and fewer than 3% with a greater than one-quintile change. Finally, our preliminary measurement invariance results show at least configural invariance over the three time points. Conclusion / implications Our results confirm the stability of the CanNECD Index, justifying its utility for: mapping SES indicators across neighbourhoods and over time, contextualizing neighbourhood-level developmental vulnerability in young children, and identifying interesting neighbourhoods for future study, especially those where the children are faring much better than predicted by the Index.

Using longitudinal register data from Oslo, Norway, this article examines how cumulative childhood exposure to family and neighbourhood contexts influences the educational attainments of young adults, paying special attention to how these determinants vary by gender and immigrant status. Specifically, we examine how neighbourhood socioeconomic and immigrant context experienced during childhood affects the completion of secondary school and university enrolment during young adulthood. We assess the extent of effect heterogeneity for three immigrant status groups stratified by gender. We control for geographical selection using a recently developed technique that first models parental selection of neighbourhood attributes and then uses the resulting predicted probabilities of selection as instruments in the neighbourhood-effects-on-education model. We find that neighbourhood affluence, educational levels and non-Western immigrant composition have important impacts on young adult educational outcomes, though results differ sharply by gender and immigrant status. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The non-random selection of people into neighbourhoods complicates the estimation of causal neighbourhood effects on individual outcomes. Measured neighbourhood effects could be the result of characteristics of the neighbourhood context, but they could also result from people selecting into neighbourhoods based on their preferences, income, and the availability of alternative housing. This paper examines how the neighbourhood effect on individual income is altered when geographic selection correction terms are added as controls, and how these results vary across three Dutch urban regions. We use a two-step approach in which we first model neighbourhood selection, and then include neighbourhood choice correction components in a model estimating neighbourhood effects on individual income. Using longitudinal register datasets for three major Dutch cities: Amsterdam, Utrecht and Rotterdam, and multilevel models, we analysed the effects for individuals who moved during a 5-year period. We show that in all cities, the effect of average neighbourhood income on individual income becomes much smaller after controlling for explicitly modelled neighbourhood selection. This suggests that studies that do not control for neighbourhood selection most likely overestimate the size of neighbourhood effects. For all models, the effects of neighbourhood income are strongest in Rotterdam, followed by Amsterdam and Utrecht. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although Italian cities have undergone several waves of touristification, concerns about overtourism have only recently become widespread. In the article, we suggest that the diffusion of short-term rental platforms is not merely a concomitant factor, but is crucial to understanding the how and where of contemporary overtourism. To this end we apply a fractal methodology to identify, map and compare those parts of the city that are most affected, and measure the pressure short-term rentals have on city centres as places of residence. By allowing the conversion of residential apartments into tourist accommodation, we argue, short term rentals contribute to the displacement of residents more directly than a generic process of gentrification or touristification. Second, platforms such as Airbnb not only contribute to increasing the accommodation capacity of urban areas, but radically change the morphology of the tourist city. The growing concerns about overtourism are not due to the rising number of tourists per se, but to their increasing penetration into the residential city. We suggest, therefore, that to conceive of overtourism merely as overcrowding is not only inadequate but counterproductive. Even though the depopulation of city centres is difficult to reverse, the coronavirus emergency is an opportunity to plan a different city where tourism coexists with other urban uses and functions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: While the association between neighbourhood cohesion and mental health has been widely studied in the general population, the effects of neighbourhood cohesion across ethnic groups are not well understood. Ethnicity is often left out of study design, many studies do not consider effect modification by ethnicity, or they rely on overly simplistic ethnic categories. Methods: Data from the UK household longitudinal study were used to investigate whether changes in neighbourhood cohesion are independently associated with changes in mental health (measured using the GHQ) over 9 years (2009–2018), and whether the association differed across 17 ethnic groups. The study used a fixed-effect modeling approach that includes within-person estimators that allow each participant to act as their own control. Results: Compared to British White, the following ethnic groups all saw a similar improvement in GHQ (− 0.76, 95% CI − 0.83 to − 0.70) for each point increase in neighbourhood cohesion: Irish, any other White, White and Asian mixed, Chinese, Caribbean, African, any other Black, Arab, and others. Some ethnic groups saw stronger improvements in mental for each point increase in neighbourhood cohesion, including White and Black Caribbean mixed, any other mixed, Indian, Pakistani, any other Asian, with the strongest effect seen in Bangladeshi participants (− 2.52. 95% CI − 3.48 to − 1.56). Conclusion: Our study highlights the importance of ethnocultural data in research examining neighbourhood effects on mental health. Future research should evaluate policies to improve neighbourhood cohesion for ethnic minorities to address ethnic mental health disparities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Land use mix (LUM) in the neighbourhoods has been associated with healthier lifestyles. However, less is known about the association between LUM and health outcomes, namely during childhood. The objective of this study was to evaluate the association between different LUM indexes for Porto Metropolitan Area and asthma and respiratory symptoms in children. A cross-sectional analysis was performed involving 6260 children enrolled in Generation XXI. Land use around the child's residence was assessed with the Portuguese official map of land cover using a GIS. Generalized linear mixed-effects models were fitted to estimate the association between LUM and respiratory symptoms and asthma at 7 years of age. Adjusted associations were quantified using odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence interval (95% CI). After adjustment, LUM was associated with a lower odds of wheezing in the last 12 months [OR (95% CI) = 0.37 (0.15; 0.93) using Shannon's Evenness Index within 500 m; and OR = 0.93 (0.89; 0.98) using the number of different land use types within 250 m]. Living in neighbourhoods with high LUM has a protective effect on current wheezing symptoms. Our results highlight the association between LUM and respiratory symptoms among children, suggesting that public health considerations should be incorporated in land use decision-making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Background Neighbourhood has risen as a relevant determinant of health. While there is substantial evidence that environmental factors affect health, far less evidence of the role of social mechanisms in the causal chain between neighbourhood characteristics and health is available. Method To evaluate the role of social cohesion as a mediator between four different neighbourhood characteristics and health using data from German Socio-Economic-Panel (SOEP), a longitudinal mediation analysis was performed. Multilevel linear regression models adjusted for socio-economic variables involved three time points and two measures of physical and mental health (physical and mental component scores (PCS and MCS) of the SF12 Questionnaire. Participants were followed-up for 4 and 10 year starting in 2004. Results A total of 15,518 measures of MCS and PCS on 10,013 participants living in 4985 households were included. After adjusting for values of MCS and PCS at baseline and demographic/socio-economic variables, social cohesion was a significant positive predictor of both MCS and PCS (β-coefficient MCS: 1.57 (0.27); PCS: 1.50 (0.24)). Interaction between social cohesion and follow-up were significant for PCS. The effect of environmental and built characteristics on health was consistently mediated by social cohesion with proportion varying between 10 and 23%. Discussion We show that social cohesion is part of the causal chain between environmental and built characteristics of a neighbourhood and health, with increasing mediation effect over time for physical health. Social mechanisms should be considered when studying the effect of neighbourhood characteristics on health inequalities making social cohesion as a legitimate target of public health interventions at neighbourhood level.

This article investigates the presence of a territorial heterogeneity and of a contextual effect in Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus in the City of Milan. Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus is a growing health problem worldwide, whose onset is largely determined by an unhealthy lifestyle, as defined by an unbalanced diet and poor physical activity. Being such habits and behaviours more rooted in the most socially, economically, and culturally disadvantaged people, a clear social gradient is visible, with the disease mostly occurring in subjects of lower socioeconomic status. The onset is also determined by the characteristics of the urban environment of residence, such as green spaces, walkability, the food environment, and the availability of services and amenities. To date, there is no empirical evidence concerning the Milanese case. This study aims at shedding light on the phenomenon investigated by integrating administrative healthcare data from the Health Protection Agency of the Metropolitan City of Milan with data from the most recent population census. Multilevel regression models show higher risk of onset in the most disadvantaged areas, regardless the socioeconomic and demographic profile of their inhabitants. This highlights the needs to conceive territorial policies in order to tackle the spread of the disease and its related inequalities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The central question addressed in this article is how social ties within and outside the neighbourhood are articulated in different contexts for various population groups. Two major perspectives emerge from the literature on personal networks, neighbourhood effects, and neighbourhood-based social capital. The first assumes a compensation mechanism, whereby local and extra-local ties flourish at each other’s expense. The second considers that these two types of ties can be cumulated. After presenting the interpretations and empirical data that support these two perspectives and highlighting the persistent ambiguity on the issue, they are tested with the support of an original survey of 2572 people in 14 neighbourhoods in the Paris and Lyon metropolitan regions. A range of indicators for social ties is used to build two indices, one for local ties and one for extra-local ties. The article then examines variations between these indices as a function of individual characteristics and contexts to test whether compensation or cumulation exists between the local and extra-local ties. The main findings are, first, that local and extra-local ties each evolve along one dimension. In particular, working-class social ties do not appear to have a specific pattern. Second, compensation exists, but cumulation of local and extra-local ties is predominant. Lastly, this cumulation is a factor of inequalities. It benefits those with the most resources in terms of income, qualifications and occupation, as well as the residents of upper-class or gentrified neighbourhoods. Geographical origins also play a role for the descendants of immigrants, who establish fewer extra-local ties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban poverty is not limited to informal settlements, rather it extends throughout cities, with the poor and affluent often living in close proximity. Using a novel dataset derived from the full Ghanaian Census, we investigate how neighbourhood versus household socio-economic status (SES) relates to a set of household development outcomes (related to housing quality, energy, water and sanitation, and information technology) in Accra, Ghana. We then assess "stranger" households' outcomes within neighbourhoods: do poor households fare better in affluent neighbourhoods, and are affluent households negatively impacted by being in poor neighbourhoods? Through a simple generalized linear model we estimate the variance components associated with household and neighbourhood status for our outcome measures. Household SES is more closely associated with 13 of the 16 outcomes assessed compared to the neighbourhood average SES. For 9 outcomes poor households in affluent areas fair better, and the affluent in poor areas are worse off. For two outcomes, poor households have worse outcomes in affluent areas, and the affluent have better outcomes in poor areas, on average. For three outcomes "stranger" households do worse in strange neighbourhoods. We discuss implications for mixed development and how to direct resources through households versus location-based targets. • Household versus neighbourhood socioeconomic status – which matters more? • Do poor households fare better in high-income neighbourhoods, and vice versa? • We test these questions with the full 100 % Ghanian Census. • Poor households in affluent neighbourhoods do better on 9 of 16 outcomes we test. • Implications for mixed development and household versus location-based targeting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Um Lebenschancen räumlich differenziert zu erfassen, stellt unser Beitrag in Anknüpfung an die Quartierseffekteforschung und den „capability approach“ einen Ansatz vor, der Lebenschancen als räumlich strukturierte Möglichkeiten und Wahlfreiheiten bei der Erfüllung von Bedürfnissen konzipiert. Individuelle Ressourcen entscheiden darüber, welche Möglichkeitsräume der Bedürfnisbefriedigung erschlossen werden können. Dies ist abhängig von der Lebenslage und verändert sich im Lebensverlauf, womit sich auch die Rolle des Quartiers für die Lebenschancen ändert. Anstatt von „benachteiligenden Quartieren“ zu sprechen, fokussieren wir auf benachteiligende Lebenslagen im Quartier.

Many housing researchers and policymakers assume that homeownership remains the tenure of choice for many individuals and their households in the UK and internationally. Housing affordability concerns and access to mortgage finance have taken centre stage in the debate about the declining prospects for young adults to enter homeownership. Yet, some recent studies have questioned how well we understand other factors that combine to shape housing and tenure outcomes for young adults. We specifically ask whether different combinations of neighbourhood effects, homeownership path dependency and social capital influence tenure transitions for young adults. We provide estimates using multi-level mixed-effects logistic regression models using the British Household Panel Survey 2001-15 for Great Britain. We find evidence to support the argument that these specific effects help to shape housing and tenure outcomes for young adults, albeit with socialization within the family appearing to have a stronger effect in comparison to neighbourhood socialization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on an advanced analysis of individual longitudinal register data of school careers of four cohorts of children in Amsterdam, this article suggests that school advice is highly differentiated between children of different migrant and socioeconomic backgrounds. Moreover, apart from these individual characteristics, we demonstrate that the socioeconomic composition of neighbourhoods and schools is important for understanding differences in school advice. The analysis shows that neighbourhood and school socioeconomic disadvantage negatively affects the school advice of children with highly educated parents, while socioeconomic advantage positively affects all children and especially children of lower- and intermediate-educated parents. The positive neighbourhood effects are, however, mediated by primary school context. We suggest that while most of the educational inequalities may be explained by individual characteristics, residential and school segregation intensify these inequalities, especially through the beneficial effects of neighbourhood and school advantage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The goal of this research is to conduct an empirical study on the effects of the segregation of high‐skilled workers—workers with a university degree—on cities' labour productivity. Using data for US metropolitan areas, we find evidence of a positive impact. Exploring possible mechanisms, we find that clusters of high‐skilled workers produce positive spillovers on high‐skilled workers' productivity that more than compensate for the low‐skilled workers' loss in productivity due to their exclusion. The latter is particularly valid in cities specialized in industries where the complementarity between these two kinds of workers in the city's production function is low, like technology or science. We use panel data and an IV approach as identification strategies. Results are robust to different specifications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Does living in an area characterized by high concentrations of residents of the same country-of-origin deprive ethnic minority groups, or does potential access to an extended country-of-origin-specific network stimulate their integration? This paper takes a new approach to analysing the potential of country-of-origin-specific economic capital in neighbourhoods to increase employment opportunities. We add to the 'ethnic enclave' debate by measuring country-of-origin-specific economic capital as the rate of employed co-countrymen, while controlling for the presence of co-countrymen and general employment rates in the neighbourhood. Whereas many studies employ aggregated data to estimate the impact of neighbourhood, here we use individualized, scalable neighbourhoods. This allows for a flexible approach in studying the impact of country-of-origin-specific economic capital in neighbourhoods. We employ individual longitudinal Swedish registry data for 2000–2010 on working-age individuals of Iraqi, Iranian, Turkish, and Somalian backgrounds in Stockholm, Göteborg, and Malmö. We find that an increased share of employed co-countrymen positively influences individual employment prospects. We add to existing knowledge by showing that the impact of minority clustering on employment outcomes is conditional on the quality of local networks – i.e., country-of-origin-specific economic capital – and on the scale of measurement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explored the respective importance of compositional (individual) and contextual (neighbourhood) factors associated with the propensity to engage in formal volunteering among a nationally representative sample of adults in Wales, UK. To date, while certain contextual characteristics of local communities have been found to be associated with the propensity to volunteer, compositional characteristics of residents tend to be stronger predictors. Few studies to date have specifically explored associations with local volunteering opportunities. To address such gaps, this study examined the extent to which such opportunities and broader neighbourhood factors such as urban/rural status and deprivation impacted upon propensities to volunteer, adjusting for important compositional predictors of voluntarism. In summary, while volunteering was marginally associated with a measure of local voluntary opportunities, hinting that the odds of formal volunteering are greater among those living in areas with more local voluntary organizations, this association was not retained following adjustment for other factors. This suggests that much of the area-level variance is explained by spatial variations in compositional factors. Further research is needed to examine determinants of volunteering behaviour at a range of spatial scales by drawing on wider measures of volunteering opportunities, before the factors at play can be fully understood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Existing studies on contextual health effects struggle to account for compositional bias, limiting causal interpretation. We use refugee dispersal in Germany as a natural experiment to study the effect of area-level socioeconomic deprivation on mental and physical health, while considering the potential mediating role of neighbourhood characteristics. Refugees subject to dispersal (n = 1466) are selected from a nation-wide longitudinal refugee study (IAB-SOEP-BAMF Panel; 2016-2018). Multi-level linear regression models, adjusted for age, sex, education, country of origin, federal state, asylum status and length of residence in Germany, are fitted to the change in mental and physical health subscales of the SF-12 depending on quintiles (Q1 - Q5) of commune-level socioeconomic deprivation (German Index of Socioeconomic Deprivation, GISD). This is followed by sensitivity analyses and mediation analyses for housing, social cohesion, proportion of non-citizens in the neighbourhood, access to green space, population density and primary care physician density. Residency in districts with moderate-high deprivation (Q4) has a negative impact on physical health (coef.: -2.2, 95%CI: -4.1;-0.2) compared to lowest deprivation (Q1). Moderate-high deprivation (Q4) has a positive impact on mental health, but the effect is statistically insignificant (coef.: 1.6, 95%CI: -0.7; 3.9). Comparisons with other deprivation quintiles are statistically insignificant. Sensitivity analyses confirm results of the final models, while no mediating factors show a substantial impact on the observed relationship. The results point to gaps in health and social service provision for refugees living in the most deprived regions, but further research is required to understand the precise mechanisms behind the observed relationships. Further research using longer timeframes and larger sample sizes are required to confirm results., Competing Interests: The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests: LB and KB report funding from the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the Robert Koch-Institute. KB additionally reports funding from the German Ministry of Health, the German Agency for Health Education, the Global Health Academy of the German Alliance for Global Health Research (GLOHRA), the WHO European Regional Office Europe, and the International Organization for Migration and the German Centre for Migration and Integration (DeZIM). KB is registered co-inventor (issued) for the Refugee care manager Software (RefCare) and sits on the board of the German Alliance for Global Health research., (© 2024 The Authors.)

Urban poverty is not limited to informal settlements, rather it extends throughout cities, with the poor and affluent often living in close proximity. Using a novel dataset derived from the full Ghanaian Census, we investigate how neighbourhood versus household socio-economic status (SES) relates to a set of household development outcomes (related to housing quality, energy, water and sanitation, and information technology) in Accra, Ghana. We then assess "stranger" households' outcomes within neighbourhoods: do poor households fare better in affluent neighbourhoods, and are affluent households negatively impacted by being in poor neighbourhoods? Through a simple generalized linear model we estimate the variance components associated with household and neighbourhood status for our outcome measures. Household SES is more closely associated with 13 of the 16 outcomes assessed compared to the neighbourhood average SES. Second, for 9 outcomes poor households in affluent areas fair better, and the affluent in poor areas are worse off. For two outcomes, poor households have worse outcomes in affluent areas, and the affluent have better outcomes in poor areas, on average. For three outcomes "stranger" households do worse in strange neighbourhoods. We discuss implications for mixed development and how to direct resources through households versus location-based targets.

Die neue Migrationsvielfalt und zunehmende Diversifizierung unserer Gesellschaft verändert urbane Räume. In den von Migration besonders geprägten Ankunftsräumen konzentrieren sich auch in erhöhtem Ausmaß von Armut betroffene Haushalte mit und ohne Migrationshintergrund. Dieser Quartierstypus, häufig als „Migrantenviertel" oder „ethnische Kolonie" bezeichnet, steht schon seit langer Zeit im Fokus geographischer und soziologischer Stadtforschung. Eng verknüpft mit diesen Quartieren ist die Diskussion potenziell benachteiligender Kontexteffekte. Ausgangspunkt des hier vorliegenden Beitrags ist die Beobachtung, dass Forschungen zu Kontexteffekten zumeist stark defizitorientiert sind. Es werden noch unzureichend jene Faktoren und Mechanismen in den Blick gerückt, welche die Zugänge von Migranten zu gesellschaftlichen Ressourcen beeinflussen. Der Beitrag sichtet empirische und theoretische Forschungsbeiträge und stellt dabei drei aktuelle Dynamiken, die die Ressourcenzugänge der in Ankunftsräumen Lebenden beeinflussen, in den Mittelpunkt. Dies sind die zunehmend multilokalen Bezüge Zugewanderter, die besondere Konzentration von migrantischen Gelegenheitsstrukturen in bestimmten Teilräumen unserer Städte sowie Governance-Prozesse in Reaktion auf zunehmende Diversität und sich stetig verändernde Bedarfe. Der Artikel möchte dazu beitragen, die bislang stark an Quartiersgrenzen ausgerichtete Integrationsforschung weiter zu öffnen und plädiert für eine gezieltere Betrachtung der Alltagspraktiken Zugewanderter. Die Charakteristika und Dynamiken von Ankunftsräumen illustrieren die zunehmende Durchlässigkeit räumlicher und sozialer Strukturen und damit auch die Bedeutung, Integration über den Quartierskontext hinaus zu denken.